Chapter 5
He wasn't sure how, but the cat kept finding him when he was rushing somewhere. This time, Draco, Goyle and Crabbe were on their way to the long awaited first flying lesson of the year, so he couldn't stop to entertain it.
They pushed through a group of eager students, trying to pick the best looking old school brooms before the lesson began. These glorified twigs paled in comparison to his Comet Two Sixty back at home, Draco noted.
"Well, what are you all waiting for?" Madam Hooch barked at them the moment she arrived. "Everyone stand by a broomstick."
Once everyone was settled and ready to call a broomstick to them, Draco looked around at some of the frightened faces.
Longbottom was expected, but to his enjoyment Potter also appeared uncomfortable.
He smirked as his broom rushed into his hand on first try, still irritated by his memories of today.
A part of him wanted to prevent Potter from excelling and being let onto the quidditch team at all.
A small part.
It was rather disappointing how many students, even pureblood ones, struggled with the task.
The teacher spent some time correcting their grips and stances. At least when those mistakes were concerned, Draco had ironed out bad habits.
"Listen up, when I blow my whistle, you kick off from the ground" Madam Hooch instructed carefully. "Keep your brooms steady, rise a couple feet, and descend gently by bringing your balance forward."
Before she got the opportunity to use her whistle, Longbottom shot up twenty feet with no control over the broom.
Everything happened in a blur, the teacher shouted, and he looked down, his face pale as a sheet in fear, and slid right off.
The broom took no notice of the fall, continuing its ascent, and disappeared over the tree line of the forbidden forest. Really, the school should have fully investigated the strange pull these woods seemed to enact on magical objects, Draco thought while looking for the orb he remembered picking up.
She picked Longbottom up, and walked off with a warning.
"None of you is to move before I return! If I catch anyone in the air, you'll be out of Hogwarts before you can say 'Quidditch.' Come on."
"Did you see his face?" a slytherin girl burst into laughter. Ayame Ito held a deep dislike for the unfortunate boy, ever since he accidentally burned an inch off her hair during their first potions lesson. The other slytherins joined in.
"Can it, Ayame," Parvati Patil interrupted.
"Is someone in love with Longbottom?" teased Parkinson. "There are plenty other crybabies you can choose from, Parvati."
"Unless it's the squib appeal for you?" Added Ito, smugly.
Draco spotted the orb and snatched it up.
The almost invisible smoke inside rapidly coloured a crimson red.
If he remembered correctly, it was a Rememberall, which meant Draco was forgetting something.
The useless trinket didn't even hint at what he had forgotten or how important it was. He felt an urge to smash it.
"Look what we have here. Maybe if he made use of his gift, he wouldn't have forgotten Hooch's instructions." He raised the orb to show it off, to the amusement of his housemates.
"Drop it, Malfoy." Everyone stopped talking to watch when Potter quietly challenged him.
He smirked as he jumped onto his broom.
"I think I'll leave it somewhere safe for Longbottom to find... How about a tree?"
"Give it here!" Potter yelled, grabbing his broom. Granger blocked him off, reiterating the rules like the know-it-all she was.
"If you want it, come and get it!" Draco shouted, and was quickly reminded how powerful Potter became in the air, as the other shot right up to him.
"Give it back, or I'll knock you off your broom, Malfoy!"
He dodged two dashes, the second coming much closer than he would admit. Potter's natural talent was infuriating.
"Crabbe and Goyle aren't here to protect you." he added threateningly.
"You want it so badly? Then, fetch!"
Draco aimed at the castle walls with the throw.
It was all up to Potter's natural skill once again.
He quickly landed on the grass among fellow Slytherins.
Everyone was watching Potter dash straight at the wall with no fear, and perform a decent dive on his first try.
Draco tried to stomp down an overwhelming feeling of jealousy.
As if on queue, Potter's landing celebration stopped with Professor McGonagall dragging him off, presumably to introduce him to gryffindor's captain, Wood. Draco comforted himself with the knowledge he didn't mess up a potentially important event.
He wasn't sulking. No matter what they all said before he chewed out Nott and Crabbe. His disappointment in himself was neither eased by his comfortable armchair, nor a purring Hester curled up in his lap.
"Don't worry, Draco. You'll get on the team next year," Parkinson looked up from one of her flashy gossip magazines. "First years basically never make the team. They almost didn't let you try out!"
"It's rigged, anyway. You did better at tryouts than Terrence Higgs. Well, except for fouling." Added Zabini as he ruffled Draco's hair from above.
"Don't touch me." He snapped back.
"Not that I care, but Higgs is finishing school this year. They probably just didn't want to fall out over someone new." Greengrass said as she swapped Parkinson's magazine for her essay, which she promised to proofread earlier that day.
It shouldn't have mattered that much, and Draco would have only been changing this part of history for his own gain.
Perhaps this time around he could have dialled down the endless stories of narrowly escaping pursuit.
The guilt he felt over trying out in the first place was probably the reason he felt so bad, Draco reasoned with himself.
Still, he grabbed a dart from the coffee table and aimed it at a scribble resembling Potter on a broom. It hit a thigh. Draco found it almost as satisfying as fighting with the object of his envy in person.
As the weeks and dungeons grew colder, they moved onto slightly more involved potions, although Draco still felt stagnant in classes much below his level.
One lesson began with the Professor angrily scribbling an extensive recipe on the blackboard.
A heavily underlined section warned them about especially volatile steps and stressed the correct stirring technique.
Two clockwise, one anticlockwise, and slide up through the centre, repeat thrice between each ingredient added.
If mocking gossip was to be believed, Longbottom just didn't ever listen to the teachers.
What else could explain his ability to mess up anything he touched?
He kept the potion boiling without any stirring, and even swapped around the order of important steps.
One of the twins cackled as they swapped Longbottom's ingredients without being noticed.
Ito spent her time narrating in theatrical whispers to nearby slytherins, as Draco worked on his own brew.
He could have interfered, but gryffindors getting put in their place was amusing.
Mostly by pure chance, he looked back on Longbottom's desk just as the cauldron began bubbling and loudly rocking.
Without thinking, he cast a protective bubble shield around the table it was on.
It saved nearby students from getting covered with the dangerous contents as it tipped over and rolled across the desk.
Noticing the commotion, Severus strode menacingly towards the scared gryffindor.
"Stop, Neville. Don't!" Granger was also paying attention, yet between her shouting and Severus' presence they did not manage to stop Longbottom from thoughtlessly reaching to pick up the cauldron without gloves.
"Ow! Oh no-" Longbottom's squeal drew out a couple laughs from the slytherins.
The boy's hands were changing colour and slowly swelling where the potion touched skin. He was obviously in pain, and looked terrified.
"Now, Mr. Longbottom decided to show us what awaits those who don't listen.
" Severus drilled each word in. "And how not to treat a spilled potion, especially since Mr Malfoy skilfully protected your faces from the effects.
Even the slowest of students should be able to cast 'wingardium leviosa' by now. "
Draco couldn't stop a quiet snort that time. Severus immediately turned to him.
"Mr Malfoy, I trust you can escort this... complication to the infirmary, mention a blockage in the ears too."
Draco packed quickly and ushered the crying gryffindor out. As they walked off, he overheard with some glee that Potter found himself in the crosshairs, too.
"Mr Potter, why didn't you tell Longbottom to pay attention? Did you think if you let him fail you could show off more? Two points off gryffindor. And you will stay behind to clean this desk."
Longbottom was clearly suffering, so Draco stopped eavesdropping and pushed him on.
"It could've been much worse, Longbottom" he tried offering minor reassurance whenever he noticed their speed declining. "Let's get you to Madame Pomfrey."
"What... if she... can't fix it?" he hiccoughed.
"Even you can't mess up that badly."
"But-"
"She will. Believe me, I don't care about you enough to lie." Draco's interruption somehow calmed him down enough to stay quiet for the rest of their way. Once they reached the hospital wing, he deposited Longbottom in the capable hands of Madame Pomfrey.
By the time Draco finished going over his research on time turner properties in the library, he'd almost forgotten about the incident and missed dinner. Madame Pince spared him a pitying glance as he bid her goodnight and headed for the dungeons.
He didn't expect to run into noticeably wound-up Weasley, Potter, and Granger on the staircase on his way down. Draco tried to push past, but they presented a unified front.
"What, Malfoy. Did you forget your bodyguards?" Potter taunted.
Draco gripped the wand in his pocket tightly, but didn't draw it out. He didn't want to hurt them (too much).
"Watch yourself, I can do much worse than those lugs combined," he threatened.
"Harry, that's not what we discussed. Remember?" Granger cut in as Potter tensed in anger.
"We're not trying to have a polite chat with that git, Hermione," Weasley shouted. "Why did you mess with Neville?"
He stepped back, feeling a tinge of panic despite wielding an assortment of curses that could easily squash these beginners. Even after fighting through a war, Draco never quite learned how to handle unexpected confrontation.
"Who, Longbottom? I don't have time to entertain your idiocy." He sneered. "It's almost curfew, goody two-shoes like you should be in bed."
"Admit it! You messed up his potion." Weasley's cracking voice should have attracted some attention by now.
"Harry found completely wrong ingredients on Neville's desk."
"Even if I did, he should've noticed the difference between them."
"So you admit it? You can't get away with it now, Malfoy."
They pressed on, following after him up the staircase. Potter skipped a few steps, reaching out for the end of his robe. Frustrated, Draco aimed a simple Jelly-Legs Jinx at him, and ran.
It was just his luck to choose the abandoned, off-limits third floor corridor to dash into. He could have sworn they were much higher up. Trying to keep quiet, Draco squeezed himself behind a dusty suit of armour and held his breath when the place echoed with pursuing footsteps.
"Where did he go?"
"This is the third floor corridor, we shouldn't be here," Granger worried. "I want to go back. We can't get in trouble."
"She's right," he heard Potter sigh. "Let's just look around quickly and leave."
A cat's meow made all four of them jump.
"Mrs Norris?"
"That's Filch's cat! We have to hide."
They rushed towards a nearby door, but it wouldn't budge.
"It's locked! Malfoy must be hiding in there!"
"Who cares about him, we're toast if we're found."
"Oh, move over you two." Granger huffed in annoyance. "Alohomora! Get in, get in." they piled into the classroom with so much noise Draco wondered how on earth they only got caught once out of all the traps he set before.
He felt soft fur rubbing against his calf. It wasn't Mrs Norris, but the friendly cat that always appeared at the most inconvenient moments. Except for when it scared gryffindors out of his way, Draco thought.
He carefully picked up the cat, and turned to leave when the other children screamed their bloody heads off. He turned around, only to see the three pushing the door shut against what looked like multiple snarling, giant dog heads.
"What on earth were those?" he said out loud, without thinking, then covered his mouth with a hand immediately after.
They turned around, surprised and shaken.
"You're still here? Where's Filch?" Granger asked, then looked at the cat he was still holding, as the realisation dawned on her.
"Did you see that dog? It had three heads!" Potter exclaimed.
"What are they doing, keeping it locked up in school?" Weasley added. "If any dog needs exercise, it's that one."
"Filch was never here, you got the wrong cat.
" He explained quietly, still somewhat bewildered by what he saw.
There were, of course, tall tales and rumours being spread at the end of his first year, but he assumed Weasley made most of it up.
Granger looked at him for a while as she thought something over.
"Did you really mess up Nevilles's potion?" she finally asked.
"No. What's the point of meddling if he always fails all by himself?" he answered with a snide tone. They didn't need to bother and chase him around to come to this conclusion themselves.
"Well... Stay away from him! And tell your lackeys to leave him alone, too!"
Weasley stepped forward, as if the height difference between them gave him more authority. Draco had enough humiliation and gryffindors for the night.
"Why would I ever want to be near Longbottom of all people?" he waved them off to continue his way back to the slytherin common room. "Try to make as much noise on your way back, it'd make my day to find out you got expelled tomorrow."